


Soft/Impossible/Soft

by Moonfishgirl



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: First Kiss, John Knows, Longing, M/M, Short & Sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-20
Updated: 2021-01-20
Packaged: 2021-03-12 04:55:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28879806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moonfishgirl/pseuds/Moonfishgirl
Summary: Nothing changes because of a warm palm meeting a cotton-acrylic blend, a mock-cable weave already starting to pill in places, but suddenly everything changes.
Relationships: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
Comments: 3
Kudos: 40





	Soft/Impossible/Soft

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Fight or Flight](https://archiveofourown.org/works/98643) by [wave_of_sorrow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wave_of_sorrow/pseuds/wave_of_sorrow). 



John stills at the warmth of Sherlock’s hand on his lower back, lumbar region, L-2 spinal disc – a simple press, hardly any pressure at all. John turns toward his flatmate, eyes alert but not wary, piercing, his gaze steady. He catches Sherlock’s gaze, and holds. Time spins out into slow motion, all the air sucked from the room, from the space between them.

John may have been speaking, may have even been mid-sentence, Sherlock realizes then. But how can he listen to what John is saying when he’s so busy listening to what John isn’t saying: listening to the curve of John’s shoulders under his cardigan, to the ballet of his hands over the kettle and mugs, cataloguing the soap-toothpaste-aftershave-shampoo-cologne cloud which designates John’s personal space, and reveling in how often that personal space includes Sherlock, their proximity as natural as breathing.

They’ve touched like this before: John has touched Sherlock, Sherlock has even touched John like this before – and more, they’ve shared stakeouts, small spaces, even shared a bed on a night away – but always during a case. Nothing changes because of a warm palm meeting a cotton-acrylic blend, a mock-cable weave already starting to pill in places, but suddenly everything changes. It’s like adding depth perception to a previously nondimensional image, Sherlock muses, even as he feels his heart suddenly kick up a notch and his hearing alert him to the loud significance of John’s swallow in the silence.

It’s impossible to feel body heat through as many layers as they’re wearing but Sherlock is prepared to testify under oath that he can feel John’s body heat when John steps into his personal space, pauses to consider his approach, then leans in and kisses Sherlock gently, soft and chaste, his eyes steady and open and so unbearably blue. John’s lips are warm and soft and dry, he realizes he’s already thought the word soft but that single word can’t possibly fully capture all the kinds of impossibly soft that John’s mouth represents. Sherlock’s stomach has never clenched from a single brush of touch before, but now he can’t seem to draw a full breath, may not even be breathing at all, and he knows his pulse is rushing, knows the blood is flushing his cheeks, knows he’s staring but most alarming of all, he can’t help himself. John is still watching him, assessing him, jaw tight, expression unreadable. Sherlock’s hand has slid to John’s hip when John drew close to him. The blood is pounding in Sherlock’s ears and he still can’t breathe.

“Right,” John says suddenly, decisively, and then his impossibly soft mouth is back on Sherlock’s but this time there’s tongue, and wetness, and a hint of teeth, and the world goes hazy around the edges, and Sherlock is absolutely not breathing. He feels one of John’s hands – large strong palm, short steady fingers – cup his jaw, then slide up into his hair, and somehow his internal equilibrium has been compromised because he’s leaning forward, chasing this sensation with every fiber of his being, the way he’s chased nothing else.

Well. Very little else.

But why chase a chemical delivered through a needle when his veins are already on fire with this equation, this compound reaction, his entire nervous system short-circuited and blazing, jolts of electricity running from the roots of his hair follicles to the soles of his feet, pooling in his belly and his groin and forcing a deep moan through his chest, surprising himself as much as it surprises John. John’s eyes flick open – there’s a flash of deepest ocean – then John leans his chest against Sherlock and renews his kiss with vigor, and Sherlock feels a tongue brush his own right before he realizes he’s hard in his trousers. Hard and trembling and his mind has simply clicked off higher functions without his even realizing.

John draws back, his own chest heaving, and gazes up at Sherlock with a warmth and affection that Sherlock can feel like a caress; he scans Sherlock’s expression with a wry, gentle appraisal, and Sherlock has no idea how he appears in that moment, cannot control his face or his body, doesn’t know where to begin gathering the disassembled pieces of himself that flew apart the moment John turned toward him – the pieces that only John could likely gather and reassemble anyway. John breaks into an achingly perfect grin, and Sherlock might smile back, he isn’t sure. He’s panting and he doesn’t know where to start gathering himself. John’s fingers stroke his scalp and Sherlock’s mouth drops open even as his eyes close.

“How –” John clears his throat: “How long?”

“I don’t know,” Sherlock whispers, honestly, all semblance of pretense evaporated. “Always, I think.” He opens his eyes but could not have possibly been prepared for the expression on John’s face: the openness, the stunned disbelief, the watery joy, the affection, the amusement, the bemusement, the sheer love. Sherlock has only drawn his first deep lungful of air and finds it knocked right out of him again. How long has he missed John loving him in return?

John laughs and Sherlock realizes he must have said it out loud. “Always, I think,” John mimics without a trace of mockery, and grins up at Sherlock without guile or pretense, and Sherlock realizes that they’re standing in the kitchen smiling at each other with John’s hand in his hair and this, this is what they should have been from the very beginning, and perhaps John has always sensed it – although Sherlock never had. He could turn his head and kiss John’s palm, but that would mean tearing himself away from the depth of John’s eyes; he could lean forward and kiss John again – that would – oh, that –

John makes a soft grunting sound when Sherlock presses him back against the countertop and licks his way into John’s mouth, sucking and kissing and biting, following John’s lead (as he does more often than he truly cares to admit). John thrusts both hands into Sherlocks’ hair and arches up into the kiss and Sherlock feels that John is also hard in his jeans, and somehow this knowledge is more than Sherlock expected but his whole body feels so ready, he feels so – he feels so much for John that it’s impossible to contain – it’s so much – it’s too much – it’s everything –

His palm, hovering centimeters away from the mock-cable weave, L-2, trembles; John starts to turn toward him, indeed mid-sentence, the beginning of a query on his unsuspecting brow; Sherlock snatches his hand away and stuffs it into his pocket, and closes his eyes.


End file.
